July 4, 2014

The most interesting, and puzzling, political development of the last month has been the impending demise of the U.S. Export-Import Bank. Puzzling, because the Export-Import Bank is basically small beer — the sort of government agency that usually achieves immortality through obscurity. It’s surprising to me that this has actually become a hot political issue. Interesting, because reform conservatives look like they may well claim a genuine scalp: eliminating a long-standing instrument of corporate welfare. . . .

But if the economic impact is slight, the symbolic impact is huge: Conservatives are taking a run at a major dispenser of corporate subsidies, while Democrats have suddenly discovered a deep love of government-financed corporate expenditures. It just got a little bit harder to argue that Republicans are the party of big business.

On this issue, I’m with the symbolists. The government should not be directly subsidizing purchases of American goods, and no, I don’t care if all the other kids at the World Trade Organization get to do it. The principle involved is not whether there’s an explicit taxpayer expenditure, but whether corporate welfare is within the proper scope of the federal government’s duties. Conservatives say it isn’t, and I agree.

If it is so successful, then why not privatize it? The thing is, it isn't something that the government should be doing in the first place. And if it is financially successful, there is no need for the US taxpayer to back it. If we are unwilling to cut off the smaller subsidies that give marginal benefits, how can we even begin to tackle the larger, unsuccessful ones?

Profit or not is not the point. Taking on risk on behalf of private companies is most certainly a subsidy. That that risk has yet to actualize is irrelevant. If you believe what you're saying, I'm sure you'll be happy to sell me a $500K life insurance policy for a dollar a year. Just think, every year I don't die, you'll be profiting.

Hey, who was the D with 90,000 in his freezer? He took bribes from two entities he promised to 'get together' through the ex-im bank. He's in jail now. Another D for same problem. No wonder the Democrats don't want it killed.

These crony capitalist subsidies are stupid and counter productive, except for the small number of cronies who receive them. Let these other nations distort and harm their economies with this crony capitalist foolishness. Your unilateral disarmament analogy only makes sense if this actually does their economies good, but it does not. And if it could be bargained away, it already would have. this is just a lame excuse to keep it indefinitely.

Since we have walked away from the Protective Tariff, there is no need for Ex-Im.If Boeing can't find interested customers overseas on its own, they need to build a better product, or die.Same with McDonald's.

Then when foreign buyers of big jets sit down to evaluate bids from Boeing and from Airbus, the latter bid will be lower even if the products are technically equivalent.

I've played this game before, in a nuclear reactor sale to Finland where my private American company was beat by a company owned by the French government. We had the technically better product but just couldn't not match the favorable terms and conditions the French offered.

It's a tough world out there and if we get too high-minded we'll get stomped. Let's not emulate Woodrow Wilson.

It's a tough world out there and if we get too high-minded we'll get stomped. Let's not emulate Woodrow Wilson.

Oh, please. The Ex-Im bank affects less than 2 percent of U.S. exports. And according to Veronique de Rugy, Boeing's "own financial director publicly admitted [the company] could 'find alternative funding sources' without the Export-Import Bank."http://washingtonexaminer.com/article/2549409

The corporate welfare that this group produces is not important to the Dems. What matters to them is the private welfare it produces for the people who work there. The party of government protects its own.

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The most interesting, and puzzling, political de…”

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